Google Touts Chromebook as an XP Replacement

With XP riding off into the sunset, the scavengers are starting to descend on its carcass to pick off some of the estimated 450 million users still using this ancient and now unsupported PC operating system. Among them is Google, which this week offered up its low-end Chromebook system as a possible replacement.

It's not a completely insane idea, frankly. Many individuals who are still using Windows XP are likely among the crowd of people with minimal computing needs, signing on only occasionally to check email, browse the web, or post to Facebook. And it's fair to say that a Chromebook would solve those needs with a minimum of both hassle and cost.

Google is pushing the Chromebook as "a real change" and not "more of the same." And ... sure. It's definitely different. I'll point out, however, that "more of the same" is also "an operating system that was made 15 years ago and still meeting the needs of its users."

But it's not that simple.

Windows is complex, as are the PCs on which it runs. A Chromebook does at least offer a PC-like experience in a more mobile-savvy device that runs a web browser-based OS. There's some familiarity there, frankly, since much of what we do on a PC is browser-based already. I've called Chrome OS, the basis of a Chromebook, limiting because it is. But it may not be as limiting to those with simple needs. Especially those who stay home and have always-on broadband Internet connections.

A big part of the Google push is for businesses. I think that is a mistake and that Chromebooks are a poor fit for most businesses, at least for now. And the PC makers I've spoken with have told me universally that Chromebooks are not selling well with businesses at all.

What I'm more concerned with here are individuals. The people who have no idea that their ancient XP PC is out of date and could become more and more of a target for hackers over time.

(Chromebooks are also seeing some traction in schools, which makes sense given the cash-strapped nature of such institutions. According to NPD data cited by Google, Chromebooks made up 21 percent of U.S. commercial laptop sales to schools in 2013. That's actually pretty amazing.)

Every time I use a Chromebook, I find the experience limiting and lackluster, and I suspect that most readers of this site will as well. But then most people reading about the future of Windows aren't still using XP at home, either. That crowd is right to consider various options, including low-end Windows 8 laptops, Ultrabooks, Windows RT devices, mini-tablets, iPads, or ... yes, even Chromebooks. I'm not recommending it. But for that crowd, it's not necessarily nuts.

Discuss this Article 24

Paul, for a lot of enterprises, it is only a matter of time that they migrate to some form of Virtual Desktop. Either through Amazon, VMware, 3rd party... or eventually MS will offer it through Azure. I predict by the end of the year we will hear of a MS virtual desktop service.

At that point, the hardware that you run will be irrelevant. It is THEN that companies will begin rolling out the cheapest known hardware to their users. Things like Chromebooks that can RDP into the service.

I've been saying this for a while. You can login to your desktop anywhere that has an internet connection which would be a dream for a lot of people. They can then sell even mid end so if you're not in an area with good internet or no internet at all you can at lease do work.

This is something I think will be built into almost everything. You're in your car and want to access something on your PC, you can login to your virtual desktop. This will make it very difficult for companies like LogMeIn which let you login to your own desktop and unless you have a great upload speed can be really slugish. It'll be built into Xbox One for backwards compatibility and even login to your virtual desktop to do work if you want. Virtual desktops are the future and then they can charge for the virtual desktop and make Windows free for the person who has a virtual desktop for work and wants to run Windows for gaming or if they want to have a backup in case they're in an area with a bad internet connection.

This could also be the death to high end computer/laptops. Sure a small portion of people (mostly gamers who will hate streaming gaming) but the people who buy very high end laptops are a niche anyway, it'll just make it a smaller one.

Then you'd see people logging into their Windows desktop via their Android tablet or ipad, but that may not matter to Microsoft because they're still getting money from them...like Office for ipad....and Android when it comes out. It would be "Windows everywhere".

Slightly off-topic, but this one thing I love about Windows RT. I can remote into a Windows 8 machine (or even a server 2012) and that machine becomes a tablet with touch scrolling, metro apps, etc, as well as whatever resources I need that are on that machine. There is a lot of power to this universal OS thing people aren't thinking about.

This is also where I think obsessing about x86 apps locally installed on a mobile tablet is a non-issue for mobile tablets.

Please spare us from thin client $#!! all over again. Even gigabit networks bog down with remote application execution - why on heavens green earth would we want to extend that to an Internet connection. Even the great Steve Jobs relented on building all your iPhone Apps in the browser and issued an SDK in short order. We fought against IT for years to get PERSONAL computers, don't go backwards now!

I hear the arguments about XP continued to be used in businesses and home use for various reasons, but I wanted to post this little anecdote here.

My wife's company (located in Midtown Manhattan) is still using hundreds of XP computers. They know they are outdated and the workers complain alot about how slow and outdated they are. They are fully aware that there will be no security updates and support for the systems going forward. They also have absolutely no proprietary hardware that is tied to XP. Why are they still using XP you may ask? Well, its simple -- they are cheap. The computers still work for emailing and the other basic tasks most businesses perform on a daily basis. They do not want to spend money to replace them and and do not subscribe to MSDN or any Microsoft services as this is also costly. They are also highly technical and most of the employees are fully aware of technology so training them to comprehend Windows 7 would amount to 0 dollars.

It's my guess that this company is not alone here. I am curious what the real amount of XP systems still running is due to companies and individuals being cheap. Do you have any insight here?

Wow,"still using hundreds of XP computers". At this point it is anything but cheap to fix this. I wonder how many up-to-date PCs could have been purchased over the years using the salary of the guy that chose not to have a tech refresh plan?

There is a very very good reason Chromebooks are amazingly cheap. XP users should get Windows RT tablets if they want to just browse the web and want the Windows experience also. Windows RT tablets are very affordable also.

I had someone bring their newly purchased Chromebook in for me to look at yesterday. She couldn't understand why she couldn't install iTunes on it or put icons on the desktop. These are your last Windows XP users for ya...

A lot of PCs still running XP are doing so for a reason, old legacy software written in VB4 or 6, which won't work on Windows 7 or 8, or old Intranets, which only work with IE 6, or of ypu are very lucky IE8.

Chrombooks are about as much use as a matchstick in a monsoon in those scenarios.

Most companies are tied to leases, so cost from a hardware perspective is little difference from the normal updating. The problem in many cases are entrenched IT departments unwilling to leave their cubicles. The fear is back office consideration.

Chromebooks have been a recent replacement for the old XP Notebooks handed out to patrons at our local Libraries. I have used the XP's in the past if I found myself at the library and didn't have my ThinkPad with me (the horror). They were underpowered and painful to use when I tried to print out a document on the network printer from a USB key or any similar task. I used the Chromebooks recently and found them a joy to use until I tried using my USB key. No big loss, I'll work around that(never again will I forget the ThinkPad, ever). The uses that I saw people in the Library using the Chromebooks were for browsing, Face Book and such which was all they needed, the additional capabilities (choke) of the XP notebooks was unnecessary. As much as I'm a big user of traditional PCs, there doesn't need to be a PC in every situation to do some tasks. The PC in every home sort of thinking in the past was when that was all there was available in technology. For a bit of fun I tried using my ThinkPad as a Chromebook, using only the browser and got next to nothing done, but the battery seemed to last forever.

IMHO the company not moving from XP and said to be being 'cheap' are actually being penny wise pound stupid. How much are they loosing in employee productivity? You can find that moving to new equipment stuff that employees are actually ok using, will actually make them more efficient and happier in the their workplace. (not to mention employee retention) So the new equipment really pays for itself in the long run.

XP runs Excel; you don't have to have a great internet connection (or ANY internet connection) to run it; and maybe, just maybe, some XP users like running software privately on XP.

I hate supporting XP, but still do. I've tried suggesting cheap new modern solutions [not including chromebooks]. They want Excel, CD drives, ...support for ancient printers; and most don't really care about web browsing so much (shocker!), and like ancient games. And gadgets. Desktop gadgets.

Don't you think if they'd wanted better "cloud support" or whatnot, they'd have moved away from XP long ago? (And I mean LONG ago?!)

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